Mountains of God – Mt. Ebal and Mt. Gerizim
Mountains of God – Mt. Ebal and Mt. Gerizim.
“Your saving grace and your righteousness are like the mountains of God.” (Psalm 36:6).
Yes, God lives in heaven. But all through Scripture He appears to have a second home here on the earth, in the mountains. God’s personal involvement on mountains deepen the meaning and significance of what mountains have come to symbolize through the ages… stability; safety; permanence; majesty; beauty; spiritual inspiration. One of God’s names in Scripture is El-Shaddai (Genesis 17:1), and an ancient meaning of that name is “God of the Mountain.” It’s easy to see why. God’s attributes can clearly be seen in mountains, including the fixed foundation of His faithful love. “For even if the mountains move and the hills disappear, even then my mercy for you will remain. My covenant of blessing will never be broken, says Yahweh Lord, who has mercy on you.” Isaiah is saying that we all know how next to impossible it would be for a mountain to totter and fall. But it’s more likely for mountains to move away than for God to withdraw His unshakeable love for you.
God is like the mountains: He doesn’t change, He stays the same, He is consistently steadfast and stable. Mountains are referenced over 500 times in Scripture. Not only are mountains the go-to place for momentous events all through the Bible, but God Himself made it clear from the beginning that mountains are His first choice as a site to reveal Himself and His favorite place to meet with people. “I lift my eyes to the mountains; where is my help to come from? My help comes from Yahweh Lord who made heaven and earth.” (Psalm 121:1-2).
Down through history people have assumed that since God is in His heavens, the closer one can get to God on high, the more spiritual enlightenment one can receive. There have been pagan shrines and mountaintop gurus as long as we can remember. People have always climbed to the “high places” for heavenly insight and personal contact with the gods, or with God. Irish Christians consider mountains to be one of those sacred “thin places” where the layer between heaven and earth is so thin that a believer can easily step from one to the other. As one person excitedly told Barbara Brown Taylor, ‘You’re sinners going up, but you’ll be saints going down!” People still refer to a special time with God as a “mountaintop experience.” As we study the Mountains of God in Scripture, we come to appreciate how central mountains are in the Word, how important they are to God himself. Mountains will be seen as a sacred part of nature that consistently has seen powerful events and profound conversations between us mere mortals and the Almighty God. Let us rejoice and applaud the God who is the Rock, who has a glorious history of preferring His own mountaintop experiences with us.
“And the Levites shall speak with a loud voice and say to all the men of Israel… Cursed is the one who perverts the justice (mishpat) due the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow. And all the people shall say, ‘Amen!’” (Deuteronomy 27:19).
Mishpat (mish-pawt) = Hebrew word for “saving justice;” treating people equitably and fairly; giving others their human rights in freedom; advocating for what is properly due to others as fellow human beings made in the image of God; wisely defending others who are being treated unfairly, including the powerless, the vulnerable, and those who are unable to defend themselves; exercising the righteous judgments that reflect the character of God. “Dispense true justice, and practice kindness and compassi0n each to one another; and do not oppress the widow or the orphan, the stranger or the poor; and do not devise evil in your hearts against one another.” (Zechariah 7:9-10).
Finally Moses and all the Chosen People were at the front door of Canaan, the Promised Land. Moses instructed the Israelites to do something very important after they cross into the land of Canaan. Moses had hinted at this earlier in Deuteronomy 11:26-29. They are to gather together at two mountains in the middle of Samaria, Mt. Ebal and Mt. Gerizim. They are twin peaks that would form an amphitheater in order to hear the instructions of the priests. On Mt. Ebal, place six tribes of Israel in order to represent the curses of the Lord for disobedience. On Mt. Gerizim, place the other six tribes to represent the blessings of obedience to the Lord in your new land. Proclaim the curses on Mt. Ebal, and the blessings on Mt. Gerizim. So that’s what Joshua made sure they did after entering the Promised Land (Joshua 8:30-34). He collected all of them, all those who survived the wilderness journey, and settled them on those two adjacent hills. The setting ended up being perfect for a loud broadcast, since the voices could be heard plain as day by everyone present. Under Joshua’s directio ns, the priests spoke the words of the Lord to the Israelites in order to prepare them for the Big Entrance to what so many of them had been anticipating for so long. Moses had wanted the people to hear these blessings and curses before beginning their new nation-building project. Moses wanted to make sure they did this, even if it was in his absence, because, as Rabbi Sacks says, it was easier to take the Israelites out of Egypt than it was to take the Egypt out of the Israelites.
The time had come to announce the curses and blessings of God. All who disobeyed God’s instructions had a curse of God placed upon them, and therefore were under God’s judgment. All those who took His instructions to heart and obeyed them were to enjoy all the blessings God had to offer. Deuteronomy 27:14-26 outlines the twelve curses that God says were top priorities as they entered the new land. Deuteronomy 28 outlines the blessings of obedience to God’s law. Every curse announced by the priests had to be followed by an Amen! from the people. They all realized that this announcement was actually requiring a solemn oath on their part to obey the words of the Lord. This was a call-and-response announcement… the priests would call out the moral demands, and the people would respond, acknowledging that they heard it, they understood it and will remember it. To say Amen! meant that they took it to heart. Amen is a root word for truth in Hebrew, and so it means: Yes we agree; this is absolutely true; this is certainly trustworthy and a sure fact; so be it; let this be true in our lives; I/we heartily accept and approve this statement; we believe this to be true with all our heart and soul!
Isn’t it interesting that in moral terms, God considers injustice to be equivalent to idolatry, incest, bestiality, and murder! In God’s mind and according to His moral standards, whoever denies the justice due the stranger, the orphan and the widow, was under God’s judgment. The word here for “denies” has seen a few versions in the various Bible translations, such as perverts the justice; withholds the justice; turns the justice aside; interferes with the justice; violates the rights of. God is in fact disgusted with injustice toward anyone made in the image of God, which includes every human being. In one’s society, and in one’s personal life, the justice due the vulnerable and those unable to defend themselves is vital to the moral health of the society and the spiritual health of the individual. Justice is serious business with God. He takes it personally because He created all people, and wants them treated with respect and love. Anyone taking part in denying justice to the weak, the poor, and the defenseless will get God’s attention. God does not overlook injustice.
“If you obey the commands of the Lord your God and walk in His ways, the Lord will establish you as His holy people as He swore He would do. Then all the nations of the world will see that you are a people claimed by Yahweh, and they will stand in awe of you… The Lord will make you the head and not the tail. and you will always be on top and never at the bottom.” (Deuteronomy 28:9, 13).
On Mt. Gerizim stood six of the tribes of Israel to represent the blessings of obedience. In Deuteronomy 28:1-14, Yahweh clearly states how Israel and her people would be blessed if they remained faithful to Him and obedient to the Law of Moses. It speaks to the fallen nature of humanity that they inevitably chose to live under God’s judgments through their behavior instead of enjoying God’s blessings. God promised these blessings:
(1.) Blessings on “the fruit of your body” = many children, flourishing family, good health;
(2.) Blessings on “the fruit of your land” = productive crops, prosperous work, daily sustenance/provision;
(3.) Blessings on “the fruit of your livestock” = successful increase of flocks and herds.
“Sir,’ said the woman at the well, ‘you must be a prophet. So tell me, why is it that you Jews insist that Jerusalem is the only place of worship, while we Samaritans claim it is here at Mount Gerizim, where our ancestors worshipped? Jesus replied, ‘Believe me, dear woman, the time is coming when it will no longer matter whether you worship the Father on this mountain here or in Jerusalem… The time is coming – indeed it is here now – when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth.” (John 4:10-24).
But that’s not the last we see of Mt. Gerizim, not by a long shot. By the time of Jesus, Jews considered the Samaritans to be their enemy because the people in Samaria were a mixed race, half-breeds. The Jews prided themselves on being pure and unmixed. Samaritans however were once Jews who intermarried with the gentiles of Assyria. The Jews thought the Samaritans had betrayed their faith and their nation to mix in with foreigners. Samaritans indeed seemed to be half-Jewish in many ways: They only believed in the Books of Moses, the first five books of the Hebrew Bible. Also, they had built their worship Temple on Mt. Gerizim nearby, not Mt. Zion in Jerusalem like the Jews. They built their temple and dedicated on Gerizim it to Yahweh in the 5th century BC, and thus they considered Mt. Gerizim to be the holiest place on earth. The Samaritans only had a shrine on Mt. Gerizim at the time of Jesus instead of a Temple, because the Jews had destroyed their Temple in 128 B.C. Samaritans did celebrate Passover and other Feasts of the Law, and it appeared they did indeed worship the God of Israel.